Kenny & the Dragon Day Three: Chapter 4 & Chapter 5

Unit 6: Ancient Greece, Dragons, Gods, and Giants!
Lesson 13 of 18

Objective: SWBAT read grade level literature, and write an abridged summary for each chapter showing comprehension of the most important events, character, and summary information in a novel. SWBAT create an engaging audio recording and visual display of one of their abridged summaries.

Thank you for visiting my lessons about the novel Kenny & the Dragon,. This set of lessons is part of a larger six-week unit my school is implementing about dragons, gods, giants, ancient Greece, and the Olympics. We study one extended, or longer text, in each of our six ELA units, similarly recommended by the PARCC Model Content Frameworks for ELA. You could also use these lessons and resources with small groups of students as a novel study. It took my class eight days to complete the study and work we did with this novel, however you could complete more chapters in one day, if you have the time.

We are nearing the end of the school year, and it was my hope that the students could do as much reading as possible while studying this piece of literature, keeping Common Core Standard RL3.10 in mind. The Lexile level is 820 which is near the top of the recommended third text complexity band for the Common Core State Standards. I also love this book for the wonderful vocabulary it offers, great discussions that were facilitated about the novel, and my students really enjoyed it!

Whether using this set of lessons with an individual student, small group, or whole class, I hope you find it helpful! Thank you!

We review yesterday's reading by correcting comprehension questions from my Kenny & the Dragon Novel Questions packet. This includes questions 7-12 for chapters two and three.

As mentioned in my lesson for day two, the questions provide a great discussion of the text. Rather than just correcting our work by calling out the letter of the correct answer, I ask my students to give evidence, defend, and even provide their own ideas for how they choose their answers.

Here are some discussion ideas related to the questions for chapters two and three:

Question 7: Why is the title of chapter two called "Dishes and Homework?

Discussion Idea: How does the title relate to the events of the chapter? Can you relate to Kenny doing chores?

Question 10: In the first two paragraphs of "Grahame Like the Cracker", the author helps build the ______ of the chapter.

Discussion Idea: Ask students to open up their books and find as many words as they can related to the setting in the first two paragraphs. Why did they author do this at the beginning of the chapter?

After we have gone through and checked and/or discussed each of the questions, I ask students to share one of their summaries from either chapter two or three in their table groups.

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Before Reading: I ask the students to read questions 13-18 to themselves in their Kenny & the Dragon Novel Questions packet. This is a strategy we've worked on to help us with comprehension tasks.

Abridged Summaries: We review our summary tips and rubric to remind us of our objectives and standards. I spend some time talking about the length of summaries today, as a few students wrote very long summaries yesterday. We review again by looking at the samples we did together, that an abridged summary should just be the most important events of the chapter, not all of the little details. I also remind students to take out a Post-it to write down their summary notes as they're reading. (See Resource Files: Abridged Summary Tips and Abridged Summaries Rubric)

Comprehension Questions: Our multiple choice question strategies are on the white board as a visual for students to remember:

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The students have the following tasks to work on while independently reading and writing about Kenny & the Dragon. My shared reading block is right before our literacy centers and guided reading time, so my students complete these activities before heading to a literacy center.

Reading: The students will read chapter four, "You're All Right in My Book", and chapter five, "The Least Bit Worried".

Summary Writing: Using tips and suggestions from our lesson and visual aides, the students write an abridged summary with an accompanying illustration to support their text for chapters four and five. (See Student Samples Chapter Four and Five)

Comprehension Questions: The students answer questions for chapter four, "You're All Right in My Book", and chapter five, "The Least Bit Worried" using multiple choice question strategies.

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As part of this literature study, my students recorded an abridged summary of their choice. I had my students record their summaries all at the end of our Kenny & the Dragon study, but you could have students record every day. This is what I'm going to do next year, and why I've put it at the end of each lesson in this set of eight lessons!

The purpose of the recording is to meet speaking and listening standards. The students enjoyed the final product that we created, which were digital books of abridged summaries. I usedCamtasia and SMART Notebook to record my student's illustrations and audio recording of their summaries. However, there are many ways you can record your students audio and visual work.

I assessed my students audio recording and visual display using the last two sections on the rubric. (See Resource File: Abridged Summaries Rubric in Lesson Section)